Look at the Rabbit Hole I Just Found
Jun. 30th, 2019 06:13 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
walkitoutA little back story. Once upon a time, I was born into a family of JW’s. My mother was born into a Mennonite community in Canada, and 3 divorces later, her mother converted to JW in time for my mother to marry my father, whose parents had converted before he was born.
Yes, do the math. 3rd generation. Not easy to extricate from that, especially given the number of relatives in the extended mix still in other countries because they never came to the US. And, Mennonites. I have left out the best part there: _Holdeman_ Mennonites. You may laugh.
While the sect my mother was born into continues to require head coverings for women and is rabidly opposed to make up (among other things), my mother raised me to believe that leaving the house as an adult woman without lipstick on was basically equivalent to leaving the house completely naked. It did not take. I mean, I did wear makeup for a lot of years, I also didn’t when I did not feel like it, and when there was no enforcement (given the enforcement was the snarky assholes at the Kingdom Hall and my mother, basically, I got to college and suddenly and drastically reduced the amount of beauty product I went through).
People who met me late in college / post college were often surprised the first time they saw me fully made up, dressed up, shaved, hosiery, heels, etc. They had assumed, as a nerd girl, that I did not know how (and a few idiots suggested they Help Me with a makeover. I sighed, demo’d the kit, displayed the results, suffered through the But Why Don’t You Always inquisition, then got out the noxcema, took it all back off and got comfy again).
Now, in midlife, I am really enjoying a friend from junior high (and thereafter) who sells Younique. She comes up with the best stuff, and I have bought a little, but mostly, I still just do not bother, except for an occasional date night when I Feel Fancy or someone is getting married or whatever.
Anyway. I am always thinking about where people spend money, and how clutter develops and Stuff and the Human Relationship to Stuff because that shit is just fascinating to me. I got to wondering if the beauty product consuming community had people doing Depth Year or Product Diets or whatever.
Yes.
Yes, they do.
There is a subreddit called Pan Porn. For real.
I had to call my Priestess to discuss this with her, because, with her mad organizing skillz, and her occasional makeup use (troubled, as mine is, by massive skin reactivity and allergies) meant I would not have to explain anything extraneous to her. I _did_ have to explain panning (I had to look it up, too), but she got it pretty much right away, too.
We are really not at all sure what to make of any of this, honestly.
I will observe that there are some clear implications for how difficult it is to Not Use beauty products for at least some fraction of the population. And anything that is hard to avoid using inevitably generates a certain amount of buying and hoarding without using. On that level, panning, and a subreddit devoted to loving photographic documentation of Look, I Got to the Pan Bottom of This Eye Shadow Color was probably inevitable.
While we are all busy telling ourselves that we cannot afford mental health support for some or all of our population, I just want to note that a lot of these products where people never got to see the bottom of the pan cost dozens of dollars ... and that is not the expensive end of things. The people doing retail therapy with beauty products would probably save money with a dozen sessions of CBT with a competent professional.
ETA: What an amazing rabbit hole!
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/depotting-makeup-beauty-hack_n_568c2acee4b014efe0dc10c9
Basically a pretty standard personal organization tactic, but for makeup containers.
Weekly makeup baskets, project panning, just all kinds of interesting things. This is a crowd that combines a lot of the numbers of book collections, with the ruthless willingness to throw shit away (or inflict it on friends and family) of Old Timey decluttering.
http://reverserouge.com/faq
Basically, adding up the value of what you used up. I wonder if anyone is doing an eat your pantry version of this?
ETAYA: There are a lot of really thoughtful posts about panning projects, weekly makeup baskets, etc. It is clear that this is really all about artistic expression for many people, and it is a lot of fun reading them figure out how to best collect and make use of their supplies.
Yes, do the math. 3rd generation. Not easy to extricate from that, especially given the number of relatives in the extended mix still in other countries because they never came to the US. And, Mennonites. I have left out the best part there: _Holdeman_ Mennonites. You may laugh.
While the sect my mother was born into continues to require head coverings for women and is rabidly opposed to make up (among other things), my mother raised me to believe that leaving the house as an adult woman without lipstick on was basically equivalent to leaving the house completely naked. It did not take. I mean, I did wear makeup for a lot of years, I also didn’t when I did not feel like it, and when there was no enforcement (given the enforcement was the snarky assholes at the Kingdom Hall and my mother, basically, I got to college and suddenly and drastically reduced the amount of beauty product I went through).
People who met me late in college / post college were often surprised the first time they saw me fully made up, dressed up, shaved, hosiery, heels, etc. They had assumed, as a nerd girl, that I did not know how (and a few idiots suggested they Help Me with a makeover. I sighed, demo’d the kit, displayed the results, suffered through the But Why Don’t You Always inquisition, then got out the noxcema, took it all back off and got comfy again).
Now, in midlife, I am really enjoying a friend from junior high (and thereafter) who sells Younique. She comes up with the best stuff, and I have bought a little, but mostly, I still just do not bother, except for an occasional date night when I Feel Fancy or someone is getting married or whatever.
Anyway. I am always thinking about where people spend money, and how clutter develops and Stuff and the Human Relationship to Stuff because that shit is just fascinating to me. I got to wondering if the beauty product consuming community had people doing Depth Year or Product Diets or whatever.
Yes.
Yes, they do.
There is a subreddit called Pan Porn. For real.
I had to call my Priestess to discuss this with her, because, with her mad organizing skillz, and her occasional makeup use (troubled, as mine is, by massive skin reactivity and allergies) meant I would not have to explain anything extraneous to her. I _did_ have to explain panning (I had to look it up, too), but she got it pretty much right away, too.
We are really not at all sure what to make of any of this, honestly.
I will observe that there are some clear implications for how difficult it is to Not Use beauty products for at least some fraction of the population. And anything that is hard to avoid using inevitably generates a certain amount of buying and hoarding without using. On that level, panning, and a subreddit devoted to loving photographic documentation of Look, I Got to the Pan Bottom of This Eye Shadow Color was probably inevitable.
While we are all busy telling ourselves that we cannot afford mental health support for some or all of our population, I just want to note that a lot of these products where people never got to see the bottom of the pan cost dozens of dollars ... and that is not the expensive end of things. The people doing retail therapy with beauty products would probably save money with a dozen sessions of CBT with a competent professional.
ETA: What an amazing rabbit hole!
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/depotting-makeup-beauty-hack_n_568c2acee4b014efe0dc10c9
Basically a pretty standard personal organization tactic, but for makeup containers.
Weekly makeup baskets, project panning, just all kinds of interesting things. This is a crowd that combines a lot of the numbers of book collections, with the ruthless willingness to throw shit away (or inflict it on friends and family) of Old Timey decluttering.
http://reverserouge.com/faq
Basically, adding up the value of what you used up. I wonder if anyone is doing an eat your pantry version of this?
ETAYA: There are a lot of really thoughtful posts about panning projects, weekly makeup baskets, etc. It is clear that this is really all about artistic expression for many people, and it is a lot of fun reading them figure out how to best collect and make use of their supplies.
no subject
Date: 2019-07-01 07:15 pm (UTC)It turns out there is such a thing as travel-size mascara, so maybe I'll look for that.
IKR!?! Mascara rules are incomprehensible
Date: 2019-07-01 10:16 pm (UTC)I think my current mascara has about 5 years on it. My usage is roughly comparable to yours.
https://www.bustle.com/articles/37864-makeup-expiration-date-guidelines-you-might-be-tossing-your-mascara-more-often-than-you-need-to
“Your makeup will last longer than these expiration suggestions if you take measures to keep it sanitary. Wash your hands before handling your products, and wash your brushes often. Try not to share your makeup, but if you do, use sanitizing products and/or disposable applicators.”
All I can say here is, I do not think I have ever had a friend close enough to share makeup with. When my sister borrowed my makeup, I gave it to her (when we were kids). I pretend not to be a germophobe, but makeup really . . . .well, let me just say I would sooner share a toothbrush with someone than mascara.
Re: IKR!?! Mascara rules are incomprehensible
Date: 2019-07-01 11:00 pm (UTC)Re: IKR!?! Mascara rules are incomprehensible
Date: 2019-07-01 11:45 pm (UTC)There is science, even!
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/ics.12053
So, YES there is bacteria! In all of the mascara that everyone is using.
And yet.
Hence my dilemma. Should we really worry about that bacteria or not? I am sort of inclined to think, not, if it is our own, very own, personal bacteria.
ETA: Possible source of the 3 month expiration
https://scinapse.io/papers/2024175836
ETAYA: Old school solution!
https://besamecosmetics.com/blogs/blog/top-10-reasons-to-use-cake-mascara
Re: IKR!?! Mascara rules are incomprehensible
Date: 2019-07-02 01:19 am (UTC)I also found a lesson plan where a teacher was having students test their own mascara, which apparently frequently came up blank, partly due to preservatives and partly due to some common bugs being tricky to culture.
I would not be surprised if the main problem was getting mascara in one's eyes rather than it sitting on one's lashes (which are there to catch icky stuff anyway). The more often you wear it, the greater chance that would happen, though.
no subject
Date: 2019-07-03 04:59 am (UTC)Is "eat your pantry" the same as "shop your [makeup] stash"?
I knew nothing about Sephora’s loyalty program until just now
Date: 2019-07-04 02:41 am (UTC)Yes, eat your pantry, shop your stash, shop you closet are all the same thing: variants on “Use It Up, Wear It Out, Make It Do or Do Without”. It is a principle that has value in all three main frames: scarcity (I do not know when I can get more, so I will use what I have), efficiency (waste is immoral) and abundance (if I do not use what I have, I will be overwhelmed if I keep adding more).
If there are other rules which simultaneously work in all three frames with respect to Stuff, I cannot think of them off hand. If there are other frames (I think there is at least one other, that lives in gift economies), I do not yet have a concise way of thinking about them.